Cross-linguistic Variation of Binding Possibilities and Parameterized DP Hypothesis Revisited

Abstract

The former study approached the cross-linguistic variation of binding possibilities from the perspective of parameterized DP hypothesis. However, the parameterized DP hypothesis failed to explain some syntactic truth as regards the binding relation between possessive NP and pronoun. It has been examined in the present study that different languages have different means to form possessive structure and different mechanisms work in obligatory and optional binding. The c-commanding relation is the semantic basis for the optional binding between the possessive NP and the pronoun. For languages with possessive NP entering derivation after T, possessive NP fails to c-command pronoun and there will be no optional binding. For languages with possessive NP or morpheme entering derivation before T, possessive NP or morpheme succeeds to c-command pronoun and there is optional binding.